Cumberland Trail State Park (TN)

The Cumberland Trail State Park hugs the eastern flank of Tennessee’s Cumberland Plateau, one of the most biologically diverse landscapes in the world. The park forms a buffer around sections of what will be a 300-mile scenic trail stretching from Signal Mountain, near Chattanooga, north to the Virginia-Kentucky border.

These public lands are part of a broad effort by the state of Tennessee, conservation groups, tourism organizations and private entities to protect the natural resources and enhance the recreational appeal of this outstanding region. When the state secured land for the park, however, much of it was acquired without mineral rights.

In early 2007, Lahiere-Hill, the company that owns mineral rights in the Deep Creek Gorge section of the park, came in with bulldozers and front-end loaders and began gouging out sandstone rock for sale to builders and landscapers. Trees were uprooted, wildlife habitat was damaged, and some 50 to 100 yards of the trail were buried in rubble and dirt.

SELC has joined forces with 14 local, state and national groups to put an end to this destruction – and to ensure it doesn’t happen on more public or private lands in Tennessee.

A Troublesome Legacy

The separation or “severance” of ownership of surface land and mineral rights is not uncommon on the plateau, where coal companies that originally owned much of the land frequently sold the surface rights, often to timber companies, and kept a “mineral reservation.”

About 450,000 acres spread over 14 counties on or including the plateau – including roughly 28,000 acres in Tennessee state parks and natural areas – are at risk of large-scale rock excavation due to property deeds from years ago.

Reversing a Dangerous Court Decision

• The state sued in Hamilton County court to stop the rock removal in the park, but the court ruled the activity was legal because the company holds the mineral rights.
• The state then appealed the decision to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.
• In April 2008, SELC teamed up with Nashville attorney Gregory Buppert to submit a “friend of the court” brief on behalf of our partners supporting the state’s challenge.
• We argued that, unless explicitly part of the mineral reservation, rock should not be included in general mineral rights because excavating it destroys the surface and essentially deprives surface owners of their property.

A Favorable Ruling for Tennessee’s Parks

In July 2008, the Court of Appeals handed down a decision that agreed with our argument, saying that “basic common sense and equity" lead to the conclusion that the mineral owner cannot deprive the state of use of its land by destroying the surface. The court sent the case back to the county court for further proceedings consistent with its opinion.

Keeping up the Pressure to Protect Parklands

Now that the Hamilton County court must reconsider the case in light of the appeal court’s ruling, SELC is taking further action to help the state halt rock extraction on its parklands. Again in collaboration with attorney Gregory Buppert, we have asked the court to allow the Cumberland Trail Conference, the Sierra Club, and Save Our Cumberland Mountains to join and participate in the suit.